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Fort Kochi - Part 2: Chinese Fishing Nets

“Go
see the Chinese Fishing Nets” was what almost everyone told me, the minute I said I was going to
Cochin! And why not! These nets are seen only in and around Cochin, and are a
prime tourist attraction. Even the auto driver we hired to show us the sights
was more enthusiastic about them than he was about the museums and art
galleries I wanted to visit!

So there
we were, near
the beach, where a row of depressing looking fishermen sat awaiting the
tourists. It was May, and with vacations on, there should have been scores of
visitors around, but Fort Kochi apparently isn’t on the bucket list of Indian
tourists. It is foreigners who come here, and mostly in winter. Besides, the
fishing nets are best seen at dawn and dusk when the sky comes alive with
colours, providing a dramatic backdrop to these nets, attracting the
photographers. We were there in the evening, on a cloudy day, with rain threatening
to rob us of the spectacular sight… no wonder we were the only tourists around!

Our arrival
galvanized a few
of the fishermen, and I finally saw the nets in action…. I was fascinated by
the sight of the huge nets being lowered and raised by a cantilever, a row of
rocks tied to one end, and the fishermen walking on the pole to balance the
weight on the other end!

There
is no doubt
that these fishing nets are Chinese in origin, though how they came here is
apparently under debate. While some claim that these nets were brought here by
Chinese traders during the reign of Kublai Khan (13th century AD),
others attribute it to the great Chinese navigator Zheng He (14th
century). Meanwhile, there is even an argument that it was the Portuguese who
brought it here from China, along with some Chinese who operated these nets for
a long time. Whatever the source, these nets have been in Cochin for well over
five centuries, and are an inherent part of the landscape. Interestingly, these
nets are confined to Cochin and nearby areas, not seen anywhere else, even in
Kerala!

These
nets must have been quite a profitable source of income at one time (which is probably the
reason they have survived this long), but today, for various reasons, the nets
are little more than a tourist attraction. The nets look huge, but at a time,
they manage to catch just a few fish, and we wondered if it was worth all the
men, and the effort it entailed. The catch is not large enough to be sold in
the market, and indeed, their primary customers are tourists, who pay to see
the sight, and buy fish to be cooked in one of the nearby stalls. Their disappointment
was evident when they learnt that we were vegetarians and didn’t want to buy
the fish. However, they all had a good laugh when one of them got Samhith to
hold a fish in his hand, and he squirmed more than the fish itself!

While
this was our first encounter with the Chinese Fishing Nets, we saw them all over the place as we
explored, first Fort Kochi, and later, Cherai. Everywhere, the story was the
same, and I began to wonder how much longer they would last.

These
fishing nets
had made their way across the ocean (figuratively of course), and lasted
centuries, surviving changes of rule and massive upheavals in every sense. Will
they be around, another five centuries from now? Or will they succumb to the
tide of modernization and indifference? Time alone will tell!

P.S. Here is a video of Shankar trying
his hand with the fishermen at raising and lowering the net.